extra

notes

Hannibal arrives at the court of Prusias, King of Bithynia (1), and prepares to fight Eumenes II, an ally of Rome (2–3). He devises a novel biological weapon for use against Eumenes' superior fleet (4–6). The episode with Eumenes is the most detailed in the Life (10.4–11.6).

Prūsiam: Prusias I "The Lame" (c. 243–182 BC), the king of Bithynia, a kingdom on the southern shore of the Black Sea. It is unclear why Prusias would be in the neighboring kingdom of Pontus when Hannibal met him (in Pontum). [image: coin depicting Prusias I]

Hannibal: nominative subject of cupiēbat despite its position within the indirect statement (eum…opprimī). Roman authors often juxtapose names and pronouns.

quem: a connective relative; its antecedent is eum, i.e., Eumenes.

sī remōvisset: pluperfect subjunctive not because Hannibal’s assessment of the situation is incorrect but because the protasis appears in indirect speech. Nepos uses the subjunctive because Hannibal originally thought (arbitrābātur): "if I eliminate Eumenes (removerit, future perfect), everything else will be…" When Nepos reports the future perfect, removerit is rendered as the pluperfect subjunctive, remōvisset (AG §589).

omnēs ut...concurrant: the word order is unusual; again Nepos has positioned a word before the subordinating conjunction for emphasis.

in ūnam...nāvem: an example of hysterologia, or the insertion of words that interrupts the syntactic flow of the sentence; it emphasizes the order that everyone (omnēs) attack only Eumenes’ ship (ūnam...nāvem).

concurrant: present subjunctive depending on praecipit.

ā cēterīs: "against all the other nāvibus."

tantum satis habeant: "they should consider it enough to..." → "they should be satisfied to...." Because tantus conveys only the idea of relative greatness, it may also denote a small amount, "just enough."

id: the demonstrative refers to the sense of what came before, i.e., sē dēfendere by means of snakes.

illōs…cōnsecūtūrōs [esse]: depends on an implied verb of speaking (e.g., dīxit, 12.3), "Hannibal said that they would accomplish this...”; cōnsequor regularly has a sense of "follow up, overtake, attain" but here must mean "attain, accomplish"; cf. Nepos, Life of Themistocles 6.3, where Nepos observes that Athenians "attained universal glory" (tantam gloriam...erant consecuti) by their victories over the Persians.

(6) rēx: subject of veherētur in the indirect question introduced by the interrogative adjective quā; it has been displaced before its relative clause for additional emphasis.

ut [classiāriī] scīrent: result clause.

sē factūrum [esse]: depends on an implied verb of speaking, like illōs…consecūtūrōs (10.5).

magnō iīs pollicētur praemiō fore: a double dative construction dependent on pollicētur, "he promises that it will be a (source of) great reward for them" (AG §382). magnō…praemiō: dative of purpose with fore = futūrum esse); iīs: dative of reference with fore.